TODAY I WATCHED (Movies, TV series) 2015

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Inside out - fantastic flick, the Pixar streak continues

thejokeriv wrote:

Inside out - fantastic flick, the Pixar streak continues

Yeah, I want to see that. I'll wait until it comes out on Blu-ray but I love the idea. Although Fox beat them to the punch by about 2 decades with "Herman's Head".

Was out bumming around Malibu this afternoon and ended up finding a small theater that was playing Jurassic World in 3D. Yes, the aforementioned complaints about the stereotypical characters, paint-by-numbers monster movie script and the nonexistent character development was there as people have mentioned...however...it really doesn't matter at all once the action kicks in. Once the critters get loose it's a blast and I had a big ole stupid grin on my face for most of it. Another bonus is the action scenes aren't as blindingly cut as is the norm today, Trevorrow has an eye for composition and there were many impressive sequences. I especially liked the fate of the incompetent female assistant.

Overall a better film than the previous sequels and more fun.

tohostudios wrote:

thejokeriv wrote:

Inside out - fantastic flick, the Pixar streak continues

Yeah, I want to see that.  I'll wait until it comes out on Blu-ray but I love the idea.  Although Fox beat them to the punch by about 2 decades with "Herman's Head".

Lol.... the difference is that show sucked and inside out was awesome. Pixar continues to amaze me, their movies are bether than many live action flicks. A story about the emotions in someone's head sounds terrible on paper (much like a movie about a robot with no dialogue in the first half or a house that floats away with balloons) but it worked. Pixar continues to amaze me. My daughter loved it and my 12 year old son liked it too.

S.D. wrote:

Was out bumming around Malibu this afternoon and ended up finding a small theater that was playing Jurassic World in 3D.  Yes, the aforementioned complaints about the stereotypical characters, paint-by-numbers monster movie script and the nonexistent character development was there as people have mentioned...however...it really doesn't matter at all once the action kicks in.  Once the critters get loose it's a blast and I had a big ole stupid grin on my face for most of it.  Another bonus is the action scenes aren't as blindingly cut as is the norm today, Trevorrow has an eye for composition and there were many impressive sequences.  I especially liked the fate of the incompetent female assistant.

Overall a better film than the previous sequels and more fun.  

I still need to see it. Sounds like it is worth seeing on the big screen.

True Detective

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thejokeriv wrote:

tohostudios wrote:

thejokeriv wrote:

Inside out - fantastic flick, the Pixar streak continues

Yeah, I want to see that.  I'll wait until it comes out on Blu-ray but I love the idea.  Although Fox beat them to the punch by about 2 decades with "Herman's Head".

Lol.... the difference is that show sucked and inside out was awesome. Pixar continues to amaze me, their movies are bether than many live action flicks.  A story about the emotions in someone's head sounds terrible on paper (much like a movie about a robot with no dialogue in the first half or a house that floats away with balloons) but it worked. Pixar continues to amaze me. My daughter loved it and my 12 year old son liked it too.

That's good to hear. My kids want to see it and although I wasn't thrilled over the premise, the Pixar-tag was a good selling point. We'll probably go this week, now that school is done.

Via MST3K:

Over the weekend, we had free HBO and Cinemax so I was able to catch a couple flicks.

First up, This Is Where I Leave You (2014) - a decent flick about 4 siblings who stay together at their mother's house for a week as a final request from their recently deceased father. Like I said, it was ok but with the cast (including Jason Bateman, Tina Fey, and Jane Fonda), I expected better.


Gone Girl (2014) - a woman disappears on the morning of her 5th wedding anniversary. Suspicions mount that her husband murdered her. This is a really good psychological thriller with Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike. The only drawback was the ending, which seems to be a point of contention for quite a few people. Still, it didn't ruin the film for me.


Neighbors (2014) - a couple with a baby daughter have a local college frat house move into the vacant house next door. With wild parties going, the couple scheme to get the frat house ousted from the college and out of their neighborhood. I found this mildly amusing and it seems that the best parts were included in the trailer (except for the bare shirt pose down between Seth Rogen and Zac Efron).

"Taxi Driver" (1976)



A shell shocked 'Nam vet (Robert DeNiro) slowly descends into gun-toting madness while working the night shift as a cab driver in Martin Scorsese's gritty, scuzzy New York classic. Still packs a disturbing punch even after all these years.

Nightcrawler.

Didn't like it. Jake Gyllinhall (I know that's misspelled) is a creepy a-hole who doesn't get any comeuppance. Pass.

Fat Freddy wrote:

"Taxi Driver" (1976)



A shell shocked 'Nam vet (Robert DeNiro) slowly descends into gun-toting madness while working the night shift as a cab driver in Martin Scorsese's gritty, scuzzy New York classic. Still packs a disturbing punch even after all these years.

This is on my list of movies that I need to see.

MetalGuy71 wrote:

Nightcrawler.

Didn't like it. Jake Gyllinhall (I know that's misspelled) is a creepy a-hole who doesn't get any comeuppance. Pass.

I thoroughly enjoyed it. Effective neo-noir with excellent use of Los Angeles locations. The subject matter is all about bottom feeders so creepy a-hole pretty accurately goes with that territory.

S.D. wrote:

MetalGuy71 wrote:

Nightcrawler.

Didn't like it. Jake Gyllinhall (I know that's misspelled) is a creepy a-hole who doesn't get any comeuppance. Pass.

I thoroughly enjoyed it.  Effective neo-noir with excellent use of Los Angeles locations.  The subject matter is all about bottom feeders so creepy a-hole pretty accurately goes with that territory.  

I was hoping for him to get some kind of comeuppance for his assholery, but nope. Life goes on. It was recommended by a co-worker that loved it. I wasn't that interested to begin with, but my wife wanted to see it too.

It's an interesting premise and the execution of the film is fine. I just didn't like the main character. I have that problem with alot of movies. I want to relate or sympathize with the lead in some fashion. If he/she is dislike-able, then I want to see them get their just desserts at the end. I begrudgingly gave it 2 stars out of 5 on Netflix.

007 wrote:

Fat Freddy wrote:

"Taxi Driver" (1976)



A shell shocked 'Nam vet (Robert DeNiro) slowly descends into gun-toting madness while working the night shift as a cab driver in Martin Scorsese's gritty, scuzzy New York classic. Still packs a disturbing punch even after all these years.

This is on my list of movies that I need to see.

Get on that, will you!! That movie is a classic that stands the test of time.

^^ This was my first time seeing "Taxi Driver" believe it or not. As I think I mentioned some time ago, I recently finished reading a pretty cool book (Easy Riders, Raging Bulls) about the so-called "New Hollywood" movement of the late 60s and 70s when young directors like Scorsese, Coppola, George Lucas, Spielberg, Bogdanovich, etc. were all coming out of film school and shaking up the old fashioned "studio" system of movie making.

As I read it I kept a list of the movies it mentioned, many of which I had never seen (Taxi Driver, Three Days of the Condor, Bonnie & Clyde, Easy Rider) or hadn't seen in a very long time (Apocalypse Now, The Godfather, Jaws, THX-1138, etc.) and I started hitting up the library for as many of them as I could get on DVD, so I've been giving myself a crash course in '70s cinema for the past several weeks now.

In a similiar fashion...

Way-back-in-the-day when I would go to a real video store (Movies Unlimited)and rent movies (imagine that, kids!!), I had a little fold-out list (similiar to a sports team schedule) in my wallet that had the "AFI's Top 100 Movies of All Time" with a little box next to each to check-off. I would reference that all the time. Never saw all 100, but I got damn-near close.

I believe 'Taxi Driver' is streaming on Netflix for those interested.

MetalGuy71 wrote:

S.D. wrote:

MetalGuy71 wrote:

Nightcrawler.

Didn't like it. Jake Gyllinhall (I know that's misspelled) is a creepy a-hole who doesn't get any comeuppance. Pass.

I thoroughly enjoyed it.  Effective neo-noir with excellent use of Los Angeles locations.  The subject matter is all about bottom feeders so creepy a-hole pretty accurately goes with that territory.  

I was hoping for him to get some kind of comeuppance for his assholery, but nope. Life goes on. It was recommended by a co-worker that loved it. I wasn't that interested to begin with, but my wife wanted to see it too.

It's an interesting premise and the execution of the film is fine. I just didn't like the main character. I have that problem with alot of movies. I want to relate or sympathize with the lead in some fashion. If he/she is dislike-able, then I want to see them get their just desserts at the end. I begrudgingly gave it 2 stars out of 5 on Netflix.

I think the lead character not having a comeuppance was kind of the point, there are real people out there right now following police scanners and trying to get their grisly shots and sell them to the news agencies. By and large everyone in the film is scummy, but that feels more accurate to me when dealing with this subject matter. Which character is worse? His or the TV producer that buys his stuff even though she knows what kind of tactics he's using? It's all about the ratings.

But I can get not "liking" the film, I think it would probably turn quite a few people off just based off the tone.

S.D. wrote:

Which character is worse?  His or the TV producer that buys his stuff even though she knows what kind of tactics he's using?

They both have special places reserved for them in hell.

From the horror box set :

The Invisible Ghost (1941)

Bela Lugosi as a man who slips into a homicidal trance whenever he sees his supposedly deceased unfaithful wife. A short 62 minute film that actually feels longer than it is.

Eureka - Season 1 Pilot

"Christine" (1983)



John Carpenter directs Stephen King's touching tale of a high school nerd (a perfectly creepy Keith Gordon) and his lethal love affair with a demonic 1958 Plymouth Fury. It takes a little while to get goin' but overall it's still one of the better King adaptations.

I still dig Christine, it has some flaws, but it's so lovingly put together it still seems sincere.  Great score, great soundtrack selection, cool effects, great cinematography and excellent attention to period detail.

I remember going to see it at the mall with my Mother when it came out, we both loved it and after the film I picked up the soundtrack album and my Mother went into Waldenbooks and bought the novel.

If I'm not mistaken, 'Christine' was probably the first Steven King movie adaptation I had seen, which turned me onto his books and other movies.